1. Field
The present invention relates to numerically controlled (NC) machines used in fields such as milling and manufacturing of structural and aerodynamic aircraft parts.
2. Related Art
Numerically controlled (NC) machines are used in a variety of manufacturing processes, including milling and automatic fiber placement (AFP) for manufacturing composite or metal parts for aircrafts and the like.
NC machines are traditionally custom designed for a specific task and contain a fixed number of structural components in a fixed configuration. Once the NC machine is built with a particular configuration, it can not have primary structural components, such as a movable beam supporting a material placement head, added or removed without retooling and reprogramming the machine, which can be a complicated and expensive process. As such, different machines are typically required for different manufacturing processes. At a manufacturing plant where multiple manufacturing processes are regularly carried out, using a different NC machine for each manufacturing process or each part to be tooled can be expensive.
Accordingly, there is a need for an improved NC machine that does not suffer from the problems and limitations of the prior art.